James S. Wadsworth

James Samuel Wadsworth (30 October 1807-8 May 1864) was a brevet Major General of the Union Army during the American Civil War.

Biography
James Samuel Wadsworth was born in Geneseo, New York, on October 30, 1807. He attended private schools, spent two years at Harvard Law School, and later passed the New York bar. He entered politics as a Democrat; he then became the leader of the Free Soil Party, which joined the Republicans in 1856.

With the start of the American Civil War, Wadsworth became a Brigadier General of volunteers for the Union. As a commander of the Army of the Potomac, he fought in the First Battle of Bull Run, the Peninsula Campaign, Battle of Fredericksburg, and in the Gettysburg Campaign; he aided George S. Greene in the defense of Culp's Hill.

Wadsworth fought under Ulysses S. Grant in the Overland Campaign of 1864, but was shot in the back of the head in the Battle of the Wilderness and died in a Confederate field hospital two days later.